How A Beatles Classic Helped Inspire Ariana Grande's 'Eternal Sunshine'
The singer is the latest in a long line of brilliant artists who've tapped the experimental spirit of the Fab Four's 1965 masterpiece Rubber Soul
Ariana Grande has a whole new era—or should we say, it has her? Her excellent new Eternal Sunshine is a bold personal statement, with her most inventive, pained, reflective songs. “It’s kind of a concept album,” the pop queen said in February. “‘Cause it’s all different heightened pieces of the same story, of the same experience.” So no wonder she’s taking inspiration from the crazy boys who invented the concept album: The Beatles. In a NYC playback session for Eternal Sunshine, the pop queen revealed that she made this amazing album while listening obsessively to the Fab Four’s 1965 classic Rubber Soul. Some of you might not be ready to hear this, but make no mistake: Ariana is the ultimate Beatles geek.
You can hear that secret Rubber Soul connection all over the album, in her combination of sonic experimentation and raw emotion. She fills each track with trippy secret details you might miss the first few listens. Her Number One single “Yes And” has Beatles-inspired flutes in the break—but she felt people didn’t notice them enough on the single. So for the album, she mixed them way the hell up, so they ring out loud and clear. She’s passionate about details like this. At the playback, she actually wrote “Enter Flutes” on a napkin and held it up to make sure nobody would miss them. (A very Paul thing to do.) That’s the hardcore Beatlemaniac nerd behavior we all need and deserve.
Two of Ariana’s favorite Rubber Soul moments in the music: the psychedelic murk of “Intro (End of the World)” and the head-spinning guitar swirl of “Imperfect for You.” But the connection goes deeper than that—you can hear it in the honesty of her songs. Like Rubber Soul, Eternal Sunshine is an album of painful romances with no happy endings. Ariana sings about looking back at lovers and friends she still can recall, in her life. These are love songs, but they take place in a world where love has a nasty habit of disappearing overnight.
Source: Rob Sheffield/rollingstone.com
